By Kara Sjoblom-Bay   May 30, 2010

Although I love to travel, for me it isn’t about visiting the most places, it’s about collecting all the tiny little moments that change me in ways both big and small. In South Korea, I hiked through the woods with my husband and father-in-law to visit their family’s ancestral gravesites and witnessed the Confucian ritual of bowing to one’s ancestors’ burial mounds. In Peru, I hiked the Inca Trail and discovered that one of the other hikers in my group was my distant cousin. In Costa Rica, I got to see an endangered green sea turtle laying her eggs and escorted a baby turtle on its march to the ocean. In Bhutan, I followed the Buddhist tradition of circling a chorten three times clockwise and spun ancient prayer wheels. In Australia, I watched tiny penguins building the courage to run across the sand from the ocean to their burrows.

Each trip I take inspires a quest to find out as much as I can about our destination. Once I am there, I want to soak up every experience available. I want to chat with the locals or, if language prevents that, find another way to communicate. As different as we all are, there is so much we have in common. I have found there is something to learn from everyone I meet. Sometimes I have unpleasant encounters, like being spit on in France, but even bad experiences are experiences. The hardest part is always going home.

I started a travel blog in 2009 and posted my travelogues going back to 2005. When we visited Bhutan that fall, I was able to post on my blog using the wi-fi in our hotels. When a lack of internet access prevents me from posting, I write anyway, then upload when I can. Now I use an iPad. I have a degree in journalism, and those writing skills come in handy for documenting our travels. I am lucky enough to travel with someone who creates images to accompany my words. My husband is a published travel photographer and is as dedicated as I am in documenting our journeys. We make a great team.

I’d like to be selected because I have a passion for sharing my travels, both with people planning the same trip and with those who just enjoy reading about new places.